There are too many people in the kitchen, but nobody is clearing out. I need to think. Process. But I can’t.

“So what’s going on?” Fletch asks me.

“Nothing.”

“Our girl here is on a heroine’s journey, man.” Shane teases, but his tone isn’t mean. It’s almost reverent. “How far have you gotten?”

I swing around. “This is embarrassing. Can we drop it?”

I turn back to the stove so I don’t have to look at either of them, but I feel Shane move up behind me. “Why haven’t you had a boyfriend? Are the boys in your town stupid?”

I shake my head. “It’s me. I’m ...a tragically late bloomer.”

He spins me around. “But you bloomed. That’s the important part.” He rakes his gaze down my body. “You def bloomed.”

His frank perusal of my body should build my confidence, but I’m still too mortified to enjoy it. I catalog it for later thought.

“So, what is the problem?” he asks. The shaggy, well-built, sexy guy who has probably never suffered a moment’s insecurity about his sex appeal will not understand my dilemma. I glance up at the other alpha hunk I live with, but he’s not much help.

“I don’t know how to talk to guys.”

Shane wrinkles his brow and shoots a glance over to Fletch. “You talk to us. We’re guys.”

I shake my head. “It’s different. Never mind. I feel stupid.”

“Leave her alone, Shane.”

“How far have you gotten?” So much for leave her alone, Shane.

“We are so not having this discussion.”

“Third? Second?” He stops, and I can see realization drawing across his too pretty face. “You’re fucking kidding me.”

“I’m going to die now. Right now. Please stop talking to me. Fletch...how did your test go today?”

He takes too long to answer, looking at me, then Shane. They share a wordless conversation. One Fletch is not happy about. “It went good. Thanks to your help.”

I turn around. “I didn’t do much. Shane, back up. I need to open the oven.”

He eases back, and I pull out the bread, still clutching my notebook. How could I have let him see it? I’ll have to bring it everywhere I go because no way he leaves it alone now. There are notes about my research that I will die if he sees.

Die more than I’ve already died in this kitchen tonight.

He takes the bread from me when it’s clear I can’t slice it and hold on to the notebook at the same time. “You’ve never been kissed.”

“Can we talk about something else that doesn’t involve what a loser I am? Please?”

“You’re not a loser, Pen,” Fletch says. “You’re waiting for the right guy.”